Robert Evans at Reuters writes that Kurtz "devoted his life to fighting prejudice against people who reject belief in a god and promoting a non-religious stance in life," and notes that CFI has "spawned a movement" that has spread globally.

Ed Brayton: "You would be hard pressed to find anyone who did more to advance secular humanism, atheism and skepticism over the last century."

Phil Plait encourages us to read up on Kurtz: "Too many people in movements forget their own history, and knowledge of what happened in the past is always valuable in moving forward."

Ophelia Benson on Kurtz's work: "I’m grateful for all of it. I’m not the only one."

James Croft: "I feel a debt to Paul Kurtz – a debt I will never now repay."

Steven Novella notes that Kurtz's death happens in conjunction with the death of Discovery magazine's founder Leon Jaroff, and writes, "Both men will be missed, but I am proud to play a small role in carrying their legacy forward."

Smithsonian also notes the pair of losses: "Losing these two men together in the same weekend is a blow to the history of skepticism. But there are many moving forward in their path."

In other news...

Interviewing for a new book, CFI's Michael De Dora describes in a video how he dervies inspiration from Alexander Aan.

Italy, the country that earlier this year declared it a fineable offense to tell a man he has no balls, convicted seven seismologists of manslaughter on Monday, for failing to adequately assess the risk of a 2009 Earthquake that ended up killing 309 people. The scientists were sentenced to six years in prison.

Mark Crislip on "boosting" one's immune system: "It is not a bicep that can be made stronger with a little exercise."

Albany Times-Union ran a front-page Sunday story on the growing acceptance of nonbelief in the region. (I was interviewed for this piece, but I have this curse where my quotes never get used in actual articles. I think I need to start saying more incendiary things.)

Religions are just collections of beliefs which can't be proved. I still can't imagine that in the twenty-first century there are people going to prison because they don't believe that someone walked on water, a virgin gave birth to a child, or a man flew to heaven on a donkey. Tolerating this new Inquisition moves our world back to the Middle Ages, and this could have devastating consequences for our lives.

Linking to a story or webpage does not imply endorsement by Paul or CFI. Not every use of quotation marks is ironic or sarcastic, but it often is.

Comments:

#1 SocraticGadfly (Guest) on Tuesday October 23, 2012 at 2:44pm

Hah! The Buff News FINALLY has something up, AFTER the Buffalo Business Journal did a pretty nice obit. And, the Snooze never emailed me back about my complaint.

#2 SocraticGadfly (Guest) on Tuesday October 23, 2012 at 2:45pm

Oh, also, the AP originally only had a “mini-obit” of about five grafs, and that’s all the New York Times ran. Shameful that the old gray lady didn’t have a house obit for him. (And its public editor didn’t email me back, either.)

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Paul Fidalgo has been communications director of the Center for Inquiry since 2012. He holds a master’s degree in political management from George Washington University, and has worked previously for FairVote: The Center for Voting and Democracy and the Secular Coalition for America. Paul is also an actor and musician whose work includes five years performing with the American Shakespeare Center. He lives in Maine with his wife and kids. His blog at the Patheos network is iMortal, and he tweets at @paulfidalgo.